


When I Am Surrounded

by Path



Category: Homestuck, MS Paint Adventures, Problem Sleuth (Webcomic)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-11-19
Updated: 2011-11-21
Packaged: 2017-10-26 06:57:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/280079
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Path/pseuds/Path
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The deal isn't a good one for Problem Sleuth: beat Diamonds Droog in a fight, and Slick'll be his bitch for a change. But it's not like he's got a choice. So now he's just got to find a way to win against the most dangerous man in Midnight City.<br/>That's all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. PS

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Derevenko](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Derevenko/gifts).



"Sonofabitch-"

You gasp it the instant before you impact into the wall, force jarring through you and turning the phrase into a pained... you're not going to call it a whimper. You've got that much dignity left.

But you lose it quickly. Before you can recover from the throw, he grabs one of your arms in a twist behind your back and forces you into the wall again. This time, the impact is flat on your chest instead of your side, and what wind you had left is sure gone now. Your ribs are crying; he hadn't exactly been treating them well before now either, though he tended to focus on your stomach, neck, knees. Weak areas. The guy is a predator.

And now he's a predator who's got you where he can rip you apart. You can feel him, his slim body pressed up behind yours to keep you where you are. You don't know how he packs as much of a punch as he does; he's not that far off Inspector's build. But he's a monster, this one-man combat machine, equally proficient in gunplay, fencing, and beating the shit out of you hand-to-hand.

Your free hand claws at the wall, trying to find some leverage- none. Instead you take a page from Slick's book and flail wildly over your shoulder for his eyes. In response, he deftly avoids it, captures your wrist, and slams you into the wall one more time. You'd been craning forward to reach for him, so you take most of it in the forehead and nose. Your nose begins bleeding profusely, and the pain through your head threatens to open it up and reveal Athena.

He takes the opportunity to let you crumple to the ground, which you do, though not happily. He's on you again before you can recover. Honestly, you're not sure you would recover, but he's clearly not taking that chance. You lie mostly face-down on the floor and just can't summon the energy or even the air to fight back as he climbs onto you, trapping your legs with his, and pinning your arms up in agony into the small of your back. It takes him frighteningly little energy, and he has a hand free to go for his knife. It's an automatic gesture, just part of his grapple. Fluid and efficient. He has it behind your ear in less than seconds.

"No knives," snarls a voice from across the room.

He hesitates. You feel the blade shiver a fraction of an inch away from your ear.

"I said no fucking knives, Droog, fucking pay attention."

The second time, his movement is just as swiftly efficient, and the knife vanishes. Footsteps saunter in your direction, and you look up enough to see Spades Slick standing over top of you. All five-foot-even of him moves with the same sharp intensity his vicious smile contains; from here five feet is a long way up, and he looks towering.

He crouches suddenly, seizing a handful of your hair and wrenching your gaze up to his. Blood streams from your nose and your mouth is coppery. One of your eyes is crosshatched and will blossom into a terrible bruise anytime now. He smiles crookedly at you. "Y'just about done here?" he asks.

Behind you, Diamonds Droog takes the opportunity to do something excruciating to your wrists, tugging them up and threatening to pop your arms out of their sockets. What emerges isn't anything like a grim hardboiled line, but a whimper.

You can call it a whimper this time. Your shit is thoroughly beaten.

Slick smiles. "Geddoffim," he tells your aggressor, who gives you a last twist of absolute agony before he steps away. You openly howl in pain and curl into a ball as soon as he's away. Everything hurts. Everything hurts a lot.

You don't even bother to watch Slick. You'll have to deal with him in a few minutes, but as long as Diamonds Droog is in the room, you're going to watch him. He's worse than Slick could ever be, and he's ruining you. The two of them stand over you, Droog straightening his suit while Slick strips out of his jacket.

"Thanks for warming him up for me."

"Not a problem."

"Yeah, I bet you enjoyed that, you sick freak."

"No sicker than you. You sat and watched."

Slick laughs. "No way. You're way worse than me." He claps Diamonds Droog on the arm. "But that's why I keep you around. Now get lost."

Then Slick is down to your level again, flipping you flat and climbing on your chest. "Shit, Sleuth," he says. "You look like garbage." Then he kisses you, a gesture of electric excitement and sharp teeth. He breaks off eventually, starting to work down your neck, but pauses to look up.

Diamonds Droog is slipping his cuff links back into his sleeves, watching. His chest is still heaving slightly, and there is the sliver of a smile on his blank face. It is a uniformly frightening moment. You know the face of your end, and it's grey-eyed and empty. "What the fuck, Droog, just take your shit and go," Slick howls at him, and Droog takes his jacket and hat and slips out the door silently.

Slick turns his attention back to you, and though the attention is as painful as... okay, not as painful as what Droog did to you, but it still hurts pretty bad. His attention just hurts, because Slick is made of sharp points and sharp emotions. But it's a different kind of hurt, mostly there to remind you that he _could_ hurt you if he wanted, but is graciously choosing to make you feel kind of good, actually. So though his attention is painful, it still feels a load better than anything Diamonds Droog would do, and at the end of it, the two of you collapse in a sweaty, bloody heap.

You think, through the blurred world of pain and hot pleasure, that this deal is getting worse all the time. But it's hard to tell.

"Someday," you croak to him. After the jab to the throat, you're amazed you can talk at all. "Someday I'll win. Then you'll see."

Slick just laughs at you. "Sure," he says. "Deal's still on. You beat Droog, you do what you want. I'll be your little bitch if that day ever comes." His laughter barks like a shotgun into the empty room. "And we'll go skating in Hell, because Droog kicked your ass, just like he did last time, and every fucking time before."

"I'll do it," you grumble, but Slick just laughs.

"Someday."


	2. PI

"More tea?" you ask him. He graciously accepts, and you smile.

Everything is so balanced between you these days. It's wonderful. You feel like your life is a fairy tale. Diamonds Droog is, against all expectation, gentle and careful with you. Polite. Reasonable. Cautious. Oddly affectionate.

You say "odd" because it wasn't always this way. When you began, things were unstable. He felt so much more dangerous, then. You're aware, of course, that he is still dangerous. But it's muted now, not so obvious. He is approachably dangerous, and the low-lying thrum of repressed anger and cruelty isn't so loud.

You've been quietly accepting it without asking. But you know you really must. You have happily blinded yourself for too long, but today it's going to have to change. He holds his teacup in bandaged hands- when he came in and you saw the poor bleeding knuckles, you cleaned his hands in the bathroom sink and wrapped them in gauze. You have to feel like you're doing something, even if the something you're doing is probably the wrong thing.

You know it's the wrong thing. You know, because when you dabbed the caked blood from his hands, he smiled. At first, it was genuine surprise, pleasure. You like seeing it, the times he doesn't hide his open appreciation of you. But over the next few minutes, as you worked and he had time to contemplate, it turned into his old smile- small, ironic. Amused. At first he was just surprised and pleased someone cared to tend to him when he was hurt, no matter how slight the injuries. But when he thought about it, he got a particular (and, you have to admit, cruel) appreciation that _you_ were the one doing it, of all people.

That's when you really knew. Even bandaging Droog's small wounds couldn't assuage the sick guilt in your stomach then.

"I..." you start, then flounder immediately. How can you do this? The break in the silence rings in the room, and he looks up at you with passive interest. "I... had a question for you," you manage to continue. You are all too painfully aware that you are ruining your little utopia. This question, the apple, the lamp, the box, that single thing you must know that will end the happiness you've managed to find.

But then, this is really only verification. You already know. It doesn't make the rest of the question any easier, though. It feels like the blood has run out of your body, and you can't quite meet his eyes when you say it quietly. "You're hurting someone, aren't you?"

He looks up slowly. Expression: guarded. Attitude: awaiting. An old argument. "Inspector, you know what I do for a living."

You know. "Yes," you tell him, and wish it were only that. "But outside of it. Is there someone... who are you hurting? Instead of me?"

What crosses Droog's face, you could best describe as pity. It's not a look you've seen on him with great frequency. He stands, crosses the space between you, and crouches in front of your chair. He takes your hands in his. And he tells you, "Don't you think some things should stay secrets?"

You can only shake your head helplessly. "Not if it's..." You can't say that, not yet. "Not if."

"If?" He is so still. The signs of life are always barely noticeable in Diamonds Droog. Somehow you never really see him blink, never see his chest swell with air. That's alright, you think in your fearful panic, your own isn't really getting enough air either. The world is weighing down on you like a stone on your chest.

Your words are low, because you don't truly want to say them. "If it's him," you say at last.

That pitying expression wells up on Droog's face again. His hands are very warm around yours. "You wouldn't want to know," he says, and his voice is almost as quiet as yours. "You shouldn't know. Do you understand what this spares you?"

You shake your head sickly. "I've... I've seen him. Lately. And I don't... I don't want to have to... don't make me choose. Please. Please." You're pleading now, your voice rising.

"Shhh," he says. One gauze-wrapped hand leaves yours to stroke your hair back, and his lips touch your forehead. You close your eyes. What if you stopped? What if you ignored it now? You could have tea again. You could have this little paradise again.

"Please," you say again, instead. "What can I give you, to, oh, to encourage you to stop?"

He doesn't draw back, and the word is spoken softly into your temple. You wilt.

And after, he pours you a hot cup of tea, and you sit in silence that is less companionable than you thought it before. Soon, he slips into his jacket and hat, and then the apartment is empty but for you. Through the curtains, you watch him leave and cross the street, then vanish behind a building. Fear and guilt haven't left. They're just making themselves at home.

And over it all, his reply replays itself in your brain. "Nothing," he said. You can give him nothing.

Your drifting, horrified state lasts for perhaps an hour, before you realize that he was right. You wrap yourself in your overcoat and scarf and tip your hat on on the way out the door, moving in a daze of hope. He was right. You can't give him anything.

But you know who can.


End file.
